Friday, April 2, 2010

Good Friday

I'm working in slow motion, trying to ready myself for next week. Next week! Sigh. Absurdist Tot went from totally okay and running around during the day on Wednesday to snotty and watery-eyed Wednesday night. So no daycare yesterday. And today they're closed, but it doesn't matter because AT has green gunk coming out his nose and yellow out his eyes. Poor thing. He's napping now -- one of God's small miracles. Yesterday, we had to resort to sit up nursing because the pressure in his head when he was lying down made nursing impossible. Poor little guy.

So I did manage to get some work done yesterday -- solid progress toward the new quarter -- all thanks to Absurdist Lover. So with the wee bairn asleep in the middle of the floor and the beautiful day shut out (we'll take a walk later -- Absurdist Tot loves going out for walks), I'm asking myself what small step I could accomplish at this point that would make me feel a bit closer to the goal. Yesterday I managed to roughly outline the quarter -- wow, a quarter is a short period of time! I always worry that there are better readings out there somewhere, but clearly I won't be able to even use all the ones I'm excited about. Well, it's a new prep, an experiment. Some of my favorite classes (gosh, maybe all of them, now that I think about it) have been experiments. I guess I could start to order the stuff -- or I could start some of the other aspects of the syllabus. It's easier to just open a new tab and start looking for even more texts and films. I know! I wrote some stuff down longhand that needs to be typed. That kind of super-easy stuff is definitely what I should do. (They're actually learning objectives -- and our campus, like so many others, is very hip on including learning objectives on the syllabus.) So that's a big step in the right direction!

I made bread today, though this one looks funky. Mostly, we're just mopping up Absurdist Tot, though AL has his usual long list of projects keeping him busy.

By the way, if you need to laugh -- and who doesn't? -- read Paul Reiser's Babyhood. This guy knows what he's talking about -- but he's so frigging funny that I'm reading and trying to hold my laughter in so I don't wake the baby. It's the kind of funny because it's so true. Oh.my.god. So frigging funny.

***Update 5pm***

When I finally settled down into typing out those handwritten learning objectives I was talking about above, AT woke up from his nap crying. I was in the bedroom with the door open -- a pretty normal occurrence and he usually just toddles in to me, but this time he was looking for me in the kitchen and wailing. He had all this gunk coming out of his eyes. When I tried to open the blinds, he shut his eyes tight for ten minutes, even when we closed the blinds and put him down on his boppy, even when he was nursing. The gunk kept coming out of his eyes. AL suctioned his nose and two seconds later it was running green again. Really, he's about as sick as I've ever seen him, with big red eyes. When I went to call the doctor and handed him to AL, AT started wailing again. This is not my usual active child. He didn't want to be put down until, finally, he saw that he had unimpeded access to a couple of DVDs he likes to play with. Then I figured he would be okay. We started up Follow that Bird, and -- get this -- he looked to me when the Grouch's Anthem started up. (I like to sing it. See what kinds of madness I start?) I even got a glimpse of his usual sparkley-eyed self when I sang it. Now, he's watching Big Bird's adventures and hanging on to one of his socks. We now have a doctor's appointment for noon tomorrow. Poor guy.

Note to self: You can no longer wait until the last possible moment to write a syllabus, because that's when AT's going to get sick. Or you're going to get sick. Or whatever. Moms are more organized because of their extremely limited time. You're a mom now. It's time to realize that the last possible moment is about two weeks before you think it is.

The Count is counting the telephone poles. All is right in the world. ("Once you set your heart to moving on. . .there ain't no road too long." Words of wisdom.)

National Poetry Month

About Me

I am Earnest English and am, miraculously (considering I started this blog when writing my dissertation), a tenured associate professor at Specialized College in Snow Town. I'm also the mom of a gifted and incredibly high-energy seven-year old, who has earned the name Spirited!, and who my husband and I trying to raise to be peace-loving and connected to nature. Absurdist Husband and I are going to turn our house into the somewhat-self-sufficient homestead of our dreams, complete with serious kitchen gardening. I'm passionately committed to whole organic food that comes, as often as possible, from local family farms and to living a slower-paced, less gadgety, more contemplative life than usually seems possible in this high-tech speedy and spendy world of ours. Welcome.
I can be reached at earnestenglish@gmail.com.